Ebb & Flow Hydro

Ebb & Flow Hydro

Sat May 29, 2010 3:26 pm

Thanks for stopping by this little thread. I'm putting together a hydroponic garden now in hopes to have it running by fall when the outdoor vegetable garden has run it's course, thought maybe some of you fellow gardening enthusiasts might enjoy following along.

This isn't my first hydro set-up so it's not something that can be picked up at the store but all the parts necessary to build it can be. I've tried various hydro methods over the years and found that Ebb & Flow is the most user friendly (and forgiving ). It's not the most productive of methods but it gets the job done. I'll gladly share my experiences and discuss other methods and why I chose Ebb & Flow if anyone wants.

The system is based on 3 cells, contained in 2 chambers. The first chamber to go into production will be the DarkRoom 120W. It is basically 2' x 4' x 5.25', perfect for holding (2) 24" x 24" flood trays (with some slight modifications). First I flipped the DR120W upside down then built a support frame for the trays and the tent itself.

Lighting for the first tray is a 125W CFL, this tray is for seedlings and young plants. The other tray is lighted with a 400W MH in a sealed hood, vented with a 4" inline Vortex fan. The fan is run on a variable speed control, temp and humidity are checked digitally

Just placed yet another order for a few pieces to this hydro puzzle. Needed some riser extensions for the flood/drain kits. Kits come standard with (2) 1 1/4" risers but that doesn't get the water line high enough for my likeing. I use rockwool as a substrate for seeds sitting on a bed of hydroton for root growth, correct water levels are a key to Ebb & Flow.

I've been running with nutes from Technaflora for several years so figure I'd stay with them for this project. Hydroponic nutrients are a racket, no doubt about it and they can break the bank if your not careful. There's other lines out there that work well, some cheaper some more expensive. Technaflora works for me so gonna stay with what's familiar. Ordered a gallon of Boost and Grow to get me started. Probably will pick up some Root66 before I order seeds.

If costs were considered it'd be way cheaper to just go to the store this winter and pick up some fresh herbs at the grocery. There's no price tag you can put on the fun my 8 year old son and I are having putting this together. It's about quality time verses quantity time these days....

He's got a cool dad! Are you guys growing veggis or what? What got you started in hydroponics? Where is the fan I don't see it. I want to learn more about the humidity sensors and those gadgets. Not a lot of people have the skill to do this sort of thing. You make it look so easy.

thanks Sage Hermit, we are planning on growing some cooking herbs. Our church has a dinner every Wednesday evening and thought it would be fun to give the cooks something unique to work with. They do an awesome job but fresh herbs in the middle of winter would be way cool.

I started tinkering with hydro when I lived in the middle of a really big city and gardening was not an option. The learning curve was steep but once I harvested my first crop I was "hooked on hydroponics!"

stop back by sometime, this will be an ongoing project for my son and I

We did get to work on the hydro garden this past weekend for a few minutes. Got the fill and drain lines installed for both of the flood trays in the first chamber. He asked why they are different sizes so figured it might be a question some one new might wonder aswell.

The fill lines are 1/2" and the drain lines are 3/4". Since the fill line is under pressure from the pump and the drain line is gravity fed the drain line needs to be larger, a general rule of thumb is 50% larger diameter for drains.

One thing I learned early on is that I hate to have hydroton in the flood trays, can cause lots of issues and its just annoying. Since the 6" square pots we run have drain holes in them there is inevitably hydroton in the tray, to solve this we cut pieces of window screen to fit in the bottom of each pot before the hydroton was added. 16 pots per tray x 2 trays equals a bunch of screen!

Back in a few days with an update, supposed to be my weekend for an overnight

hydroguy

Sage Hermitsorry I missed part of your ealier question. The fan can be seen in the 3rd picture down. Upper left corner of the tent, attached to the flex duct that goes to the sealed hood of the 400. Air intake for the hood is on the back side and kinda hard to see. Indoor gardening with HID lighting means you have to control every aspect of your garden or it'll crash and burn. Light, Air & Water.

Did manage to get some pics taken, hopefully I'll remember how to upload them

Here's a shot of the fill / drain risers. These are one's from Sunleaves which just slip together. I've ran some from Botanicare and din't care for them as they are large and screw together. Final heigth adjustment will be when water is added.

Here's a couple pics of the file drain lines installed. System is coming together slowly.

The outdoor garden is keeping us busy but we did get some time last weekend to work on the winter indoor garden. The first chamber is only missing a couple of cycle timers and it's ready to run so we spent our time working on the 2nd chamber.

It's a DR80 and like the DR120 we flipped it upside down and made a frame out of wood:

Next we made a false bottom out of some scrap wood to get the pots off the floor:

Like the first chamber this one will be Ebb & Flow but with our own unique twist to it. I ran an Ebb & Grow system from CAP Industries and will be useing parts of that system in this chamber. The control module from the E&G will be replaced with a manifold (my own design) and the 55gl. drum resv. will be replaced with a resv. similar to the ones in the 1st chamber. Work this time was focused on the pots so that's where we'll start.

Here's a look at the double pots. The lower pot is plumbed into the fill/drain lines through the single hole on the side. The upper pot has holes drilled across the bottom. This method allows the gardener to move plants in the chamber during the growing season:

The pots we are useing are pricey and could easily be replaced with simple buckets from a home supply store but I already have them so here's how they work. Some grommets, tee's, elbow's and straight connectors can be picked up at most any hydro store cheaply:

All the parts and tubing are 1/2" in diameter, the holes can be drilled out with a step-bit if purchasing your own pots:

First step is to install the grommet in the hole, make sure the lip of the pot sits snuggly in the grove of the grommet. A really important step here to avoid problems down the road:

Once you have the layout of the buckets figured out you'll know what type of adapter goes in the grommet. A single drop of dish soap smeared around the connector makes it slide right in:

Even though the tubing is flexible, warming it up some and a drop of soap makes it much easier to work with. Here's where the raised floor comes into play. A supply line is ran uner the pots and out through the hole in the floor of the chamber. This line will be attached to the manifold later but for now we are just getting the pots ready:

The reason why I am doing this whole project, my son. With a little guidance from dad he is doing the work on our indoor winter garden.

Back in a few, just about time to figure out what we are going to be growing this winter.

The pumps for the first chamber are rated at 138gl/hr. Pump for the 2nd chamber will be a bit larger but not much. I do have a 396 gl/hr pump for transfers but we run 15 minute interval cycle timers so these small pumps fill the trays in more than adequate time.

That little one of yours sure has the spirit and a good helper in you, hg. This Eb and Flo thread you started is the best. So you talked about the church and him helping decide the plants to grow? Hear what everyone says and what they would grow.

Appreciate the comment on the thread. The purpose of doing it was to have fun with my son but to also show fellow gardeners that hydroponics really isn't as complicated as it seems. There's a few basic principles to understand but once you get that down these things really do run themselves.

Still haven't figured out exactly what we are going to be growing but I guess we need to be thinking about that part of it soon. Plan for now is to have some seeds in there by the end of July/early August. We'll be running the floro for a few weeks so it's a matter not kicking the HID lights on until cooler weather sets in.

Still a few parts needed before water goes in, been looking at some PH and PPM testers which are the backbone of any hydroponic system. You've got to know what is in the water, this is hydroponics LOL.

Time to go pick some veggies from the summer garden, if it doesn't rain soon there wont be much to pick in a week.

The garden is right on target for a July planting, cells 1 & 2 in the first chamber are completed. All we needed was a cycle timer for the pumps and its here now, running a single timer with dual outlets for both systems. It's a 15 minute cycle timer which will run 6 cycles lights on 1 cycle lights off. Frequency of cycle varies depending on plant age but this one timer can easily handle both systems with a little manual intervention for seedlings.

We talked to the cooks and they could use the basics really; basil, oregano and were gonna throw in some chives for good measure. Get to that part when all the seeds show up.

The biggest accomplishment this week was finally picking out the testing equipment. Big surprise here we went with exactly the same testers that I have used since I got into hydro. Milwaukee brand Sharp testers. These are not the very top of the line units but they reliable accurate testers that have served me well for years.

Some folks use the litmus strips for testing their Ph, fine and dandy but for me that only works with the tap water we have. Our nutrients change the color of the resv. so the litmus is useless at this point for testing. I like the Sharp Ph51, it's waterproof so accidents aren't an issue. Initail use and maintenance are the critical parts for these types of testers. The unit must be soaked for 6 hours before initial use or the readings are inaccurate. After initial soaking and calibrating proper storage is critical. My personnel preferrence is to use GH brand storage solution. Few ml's in the cap and the unit sits on the shelf cap down just like in the pics that follow. Probe can not be allowed to dry out, ever. Advantage to this method is that when I turn the unit on it's sitting in a known solution of 7.0 Ph, if it reads anything different I rinse off the probe and change out the storage solution. 99.9% of the time it again reads 7.0 and I'm ready to test the waters so to speak with a unit I know is accurate.

Next is to test the resv to find the concentration of nutrients available to the plants. This testing doesn't say what's there but how strong the mix is. This is where it gets a bit complicated as there are various methods to test: EC, TDS, PPM and with the those methods there's sub catagories like the PPM in 1900 and 9999 methods. Then there's the conversion factors used to obtain these levels etc. etc. Saying my EC level of 2.2 is equal to 1750 PPM (just an example) depends on what the conversion factor is being used. Point to all this is to keep it simple. I use the same method allways, the Sharp T75 tester.

Point to all this rambling is that there is no other aspect of hydroponics as important as proper nutrient management. Pick your lights, medium and method and they stay constant throughout the grow, your resv. is changing daily and if you can't stay on top of it than everything else is pointless. A few dollars spent upfront here is critical to a successful garden.